Farmers protest at collector’s office in Sangli

Drought-affected farmers in Sangli district staged massive demonstrations and barged into the Sangli collector’s office on Monday.

Drought-affected farmers in Sangli district staged massive demonstrations and barged into the Sangli collector’s office on Monday.

They were demonstrating under the banner of the ‘Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghtana’ (SSS).

The farmers barged into the office and tried to meet collector Shyam Vardhane, who was not in office at the time. When the police could not control the mob, they informed the collector who then came and accepted the farmers’ statement of demands.

A milk can that was brought for submitting to the collector was also broken during the protests. To this, SSS chief and member of parliament, Raju Shetty said that since water was scare and milk abundant, additional stock of milk was being wasted. Shetty also said that drought affected farmers were neither getting water nor fodder and were being neglected by the administration.

He said the administration however had records of tankers supplying water to the farmers, without them actually having received any benefits. Shetty threatened to set VIP cars ablaze, if the administration did not improve the situation urgently.